In a few months hopefully 
Near future to me means within a year or so 
1 Like
Hello there! Welcome to the race!
Well itās more like a marathon for me, so if you keep your speed, youāll be my level in no time!
Ima keep track
2 Likes
Yep! I sent an email to them and got it that way. You have to use paypal or write a special line of like āI authorize Wankani to take $60 from me credit cardā or whatever for it to be applied.
1 Like
My first level up since Iām in a race! Took me 7 days and like 15 hours to clear this level, though learning new radicals, kanji and words took a better part of my evening as well.
Either way, that part is accounted for, hopefully Iāll hit level 7 next Wednesday/Thursday as well 
Good luck everyone!
1 Like
hey thats a fairly speedy level up time! if you dont mind me asking, how do you level up so fast? atm im like 9 days per level even though i do my reviews right when they come most of the time
Once I see new kanji, I try to read their mnemonics and get through the initial Apprentice 1 level up.
Then I slow down, do some Bunpro or watch some anime, return back to those characters an hour or two later, read those mnemonics over again, pull up my scrapbook and write those kanji down along with their (mostly) onāyomi readings.
I make sure to mark every radical that makes a kanji and by the time Iām done with the list I have read both of the mnemonics at least two times, know the readings and by the time the Apprentice 2 -> Apprentice 3 promotion comes up I try to recall the stories that Koichi has tried to teach me. If I canāt, which happens rarely, but it happens, I look up the mnemonic one more time and try to record it deep in my memory. The level up from Apprentice 2 to Apprentice 3 takes the longest for me, if itās around 100 items then it can take up to 40 minutes, but by the time Iām levelling up from Apprentice 3 to Apprentice 4 I get to around 97% accuracy in no time already.
The timings between reviews are always consistent for me:
Thursday 11am -> Thursday 3pm -> Thursday 11pm -> Friday 10pm -> Sunday 9pm
Sunday 9pm -> Sunday 1am (got some lax periods here) -> Monday when-i-wake-up (so around 11am-12pm) -> Tuesday 11am -> Thursday 10-11am
This routine takes exactly 7 days 0 hours a level.
Thereās two things worth keeping track though;
- Itās probably not sustainable outside of the quarantine, this takes up to five hours on-off each day new items are brought to the table. I wonāt be able to keep doing it forever, but Iām doing it for as long as I can and I take huge pride out of it so far!
- You get to eventually forget some of the older kanji and you actually have to take some time off, for example on Tuesdays, to remind yourself of what some of your weakest kanji are.
It was a huge help that I could attend a Japanese course for 5 semesters before the language schools closed down for the lockdown, but I think Iāve managed to already work my way up from the basics to where I was before I stopped, so Iām very glad that happened.
Donāt forget to find different methods of indulging with the culture as well, Iāve switched my Nintendo Switch to Japanese and Iām slowly going through Animal Crossing and Pokemon Shield, though the second one is causing me some serious suffering when you get to longer dialogues 
I hope that by the same time next year my WaniKani journey will be over already, but as I said, I canāt just stay at home and do those characters endlessly, Iāll actually have to readjust my schedule around July. Until then, ć大äŗć«!
1 Like
wow. this was such an indepth explanation. thank you so much for taking the time out of your day, I really appreciate it! I wonāt lie, spending 5 hours some days sounds like a lot. but honestly, ive been at wanikani for about a month and a half and I think its time i start to develop a routine like this. so I think im gonna give your model a go! just one question: does writing down the kanji during the off time between reviews effect the SRS system?
You might wanna read the beginnerās guide My Journey of 368 days (+ The Ultimate Guide for WK š )
As for your question: yes, if you have to look at the kanji to write it down then youāre effectively resetting the interval, which defeats the whole purpose of srs. If you want to write it down then Iād say do it just after your lesson/review session, not halfway between your next srs interval. Thereās only one valid reason to look at the kanji between intervals and thatās if you naturally encounter it through immersion.
1 Like
thanks, this was very helpful
1 Like
Yep, what youāve said is correct, the concept I was referring to when writing to @heidiwankanobe was in fact leeches, so those kanji that youāve written right 5 times, then wrong two times, then right two times, wrong two times and over and over. I take some time on the down days to reexamine what is it thatās making me forget those words and right now thereās quite a few!
I hope that the apprentice heap size is going to start getting smaller than bigger eventually, I managed to get a few of those into Master already, so thereās hoping
1 Like
thank u
update: i followed your method and have upgraded in seven days 
thank you again so much! game changer
1 Like
I just got to lv15 and Iām one day away from 100 days studying WaniKani! Thatās one quarter of the journey already, and 3/8 of the longer part. Coolio!
I think thatās a pretty solid accomplishment considering how bad I am at keeping streaks of anything. One thing Iām getting progressively worried about though is that Iām a type of a person that either goes 100% in or I put in 0% effort, Iām worried that not only Iām going to derail if I miss one day, but that Iām going to derail if I miss one review schedule and my weekly schedule wonāt be able to keep up.
I noticed that if I have a 450-review day, such as Thursdays, Iām so exhausted from practicing all the words that I donāt do any other Japanese reading at all both that and the next day - WaniKani seems to be draining my energy in that regard! Maybe itās just an excuse for me being lazy, who knows.
Either way, to celebrate my 99 day milestone on WaniKani Iāll probably do absolutely nothing as usual!
Iām on the verge of 500 kanji studied right now, Iāll break way past it this Sunday. It pisses me off even more than usual when I read a Japanese sentence and I see just ONE character I donāt understand out of a 5-kanji compound, but Iām working on it, slowly, but surely.
I made a Japanese Google Account! Havenāt used it much yet, but the YouTube recommendations are looking good so far, seems like the generic YouTube conversation starter in Japan seems to be the topic of pets. Japanese mostly arenāt allowed to have pets in their flats, thatās why the videos containing pets have such a good click rate. The people in those videos seem particularly enthusiastic towards the idea of taking care of the pets too!
Unfortunately, Iām really, really bad at understanding the Japanese in the videos. Itās not even that itās natural language instead of the by-the-textbook-one, Iām simply too slow to understand what is being spoken. I donāt know if choosing x0.5 speed for the video is a good idea in that context, but weāll see how it plays out.
I think Iāll need to join a book club here someday, Iāll have to make up my mind eventually.
5 Likes
Just found this thread, sounds like fun! How does this work exactly? Can I just add myself to one of the groups?
2 Likes
Sure, help yourself!
That being said, Iām afraid this thread isnāt very active anymore. You probably want to check the Olympian or luminaries threads. Similar idea but those are active.
1 Like
Ah, ok! Thank you!
1 Like
I added a group called BiWeekly Babes (and borrowed the lovely formatting of Sad, quiet animals, thank you!!)
I wanna try to keep to 2 week level up schedule and keep chugging along until level 60, feel free to join me if that sounds like something you wanna aim for also and hopefully we can keep each other on track!
Well there are a few people, like me, still updating our progress, but the racing element certainly seems to have died away.
@chiasa, come and promote yourself to the higher echelons! It will make me the top of the list for a while (no idea how many Naughty Narwhals under me are still in the game).
2 Likes
I have been summoned!! lol you actually caught me at a good time, I have been relatively inactive on WK for a long time, but a slow day at work meant I reminded myself to check WKā¦ and so many reviews -shudder-
I can say cake tastes pretty good Although I should have bought a special cake and threw myself a little party while I was in Japan heh 
You got this!! Reaching the top is great. 
3 Likes
Actually bumping this before it closes.
I think some people can use the motivation.
Hopefully some newbies who need the push see it.
3 Likes